Normandy Minerals (ASX:NMD) reports gold results from Halleys drilling
Normandy Minerals has reported initial assays from its maiden diamond drilling program at the Halleys Deposit in Western Australia, where exploration is testing the geometry and repetition of mineralisation identified in historical data.
The deposit lies within the company’s Halleys Project, approximately 200km north of Southern Cross, with results received from 2 holes and further assays pending.
Highlights
Hole 26NMDD0008 returned 17m at 10.50g/t gold from 65m, including 5.2m at 26.53g/t and 5m at 7.92g/t.
Hole 26NMDD0014 intersected 1m at 10.20g/t gold from 60.8m but did not intersect its intended target.
Approximately 905m of diamond drilling has been completed, with reverse circulation drilling scheduled to commence in late October 2026.
Historical exploration at Halleys identified gold mineralisation that led to mining of the existing pit, where operations finished in 2014.
Normandy’s current drilling was completed on prospecting licence P77/4706, which the company owns 100%, with no royalties applying and no material impediment to the reported work identified.
The deposit lies close to the intersection of the Halleys Shear and Moondie Shear, with gold mineralisation hosted within a steeply southeast dipping basaltic sequence containing subordinate ultramafic rocks and intruded by quartz feldspar biotite porphyries.
Mineralised zones are mainly hosted in altered mafic volcanic rocks and characterised by strong shearing, silica enrichment and quartz and calcite veinlets.
Alongside its principal intersection, 26NMDD0008 returned 3m at 4.75g/t gold from 31m and 8.4m at 0.74g/t from 38.6m.
Normandy states that these multiple intervals support its interpretation of stacked mineralised lenses, while structural information obtained from the core supports the company’s interpreted geometry and adopted drilling orientation.
Normandy Managing director and chief executive Josh Conner said,
“These results are an important step in Normandy’s broader strategy to build a substantial inventory of high-grade ounces across the Halleys district.”
Hole 26NMDD0014 was designed to investigate historical hole BRC0135, which returned 6m at 102.66g/t gold within a broader interval of 14m at 45.32g/t.
Access restrictions near the pit required drilling partly down dip, with unexpected deviation preventing interception of the target mineralisation.
Uncertainty over the historical hole’s position and orientation, together with the access constraints and drilling geometry, meant the current hole was not an exact twin.
Reported intersections are downhole lengths, and the announcement states that available drilling spacing is insufficient on its own to demonstrate geological or grade continuity for mineral resource estimation.
The 17m composite is an exception to the stated interval reporting constraints, presented to reflect the overall mineralised zone, while no mineral resource estimate or metallurgical results are reported.
The continuing program includes geological and structural logging, magnetic susceptibility measurements and portable XRF readings, with the latter used for geological interpretation rather than reporting gold grades.
Full analysis of mineralisation controls and the structural setting is planned after completion of core drilling.
The scheduled reverse circulation program will test extensions to known mineralisation and additional priority targets.
Normandy also plans systematic sampling of the historical stockpile to assess grade distribution, variability and metallurgical characteristics, while soil geochemistry and recent geophysical review findings will guide regional drill targeting.